Hezbollah Strikes. Israelis Evacuate.
KFAR YUVAL, Israel — More than 60,000 Israelis far from Gaza but close to the front line of another conflict have been ordered from their homes along Israel’s northern border with Lebanon.
In one border town, anti-tank missiles fired from Lebanon have damaged scores of homes. In another village, evacuation holdouts said they avoided turning on lights to keep from becoming visible targets.
The evacuations and an effort in Lebanon to move thousands away from the border are the result of an intensifying conflict between Israel and Hezbollah, the Lebanese militia and political organization.
The stretch of Israel through the Galilee Panhandle — which juts into Lebanon — and west toward the Mediterranean has become a virtual no-go zone. Military checkpoints block access to communities. Some residents say the evacuations showed weakness. Others say they have saved many lives.
Chaim Amedi, 82, a resident of the mostly deserted village of Kfar Yuval, has refused to abandon the town and evacuate to a hotel. “You don’t leave a home,” he said, adding that “hotels are for vacations.”
Hezbollah, backed by Iran, began firing across the border after Hamas’s October 7 attack on Israel. The attacks have been big enough to show solidarity with Hamas, but measured enough to prevent all-out conflict. Some days, Hezbollah has fired up to 100 short-range rockets. Israel, in turn, has struck targets 100 kilometers inside Lebanon.
In Kiryat Shmona, an Israeli city of about 24,000, about 1,500 inhabitants remain. The banks and malls are closed. The startup companies at the city’s food-technology hub have left. Only one eatery is open, catering mainly to soldiers.
Toby Abutbul, 22, the son of the owner, showed video of what he said were two anti-tank missiles landing in front of him in February. A nearby woman and her teenage son were severely wounded, according to the local authorities.
Israeli officials say they are considering military action to push Hezbollah back from the border unless a diplomatic effort can avoid it. In the meantime, the death toll on both sides is rising.
The Israeli military said it had struck more than 4,500 Hezbollah targets in both Lebanon and neighboring Syria, and that they had killed more than 300 Hezbollah operatives. Fourteen Israeli soldiers have been killed in the north, according to the Israeli authorities.
Eitan Davidi, 53, a farmer from Margaliot, said he has seen Hezbollah forces monitoring the town through the border fence.
“They studied each community, studied us personally, our routines, our places of employment,” Mr. Davidi said. “They know when I come, when I go. They know my kids.”
Mr. Davidi, who produces chicken eggs, said he gave interviews to the Israeli news media in which he said Lebanese border villages harboring Hezbollah fighters should be razed — “Not on their heads,” he said, only the buildings.
In response, he said he received a WhatsApp message reminding him that his chicken coops had already been hit twice. “We won’t miss the target a third time,” the message read. It was signed Hezbollah. The New York Times could not independently confirm the origin of the message.
Next came a social media post from a correspondent for Al Manar, Hezbollah’s television channel, calling Mr. Davidi the “mule” of Margaliot. The post included images of gunmen on the Lebanese side of the border with Mr. Davidi’s village, his chicken coops and home in the background.
Missiles and rockets have since incinerated most of his coops. An anti-tank missile fired into Margaliot on March 4 killed a farm laborer from India and injured seven more foreign workers, according to the Israeli military.
Officials have also blamed Israel for targeting civilians. In February, after a family was killed in an Israeli strike, Najib Mikati, Lebanon’s caretaker prime minister, accused Israel of “killing and targeting of innocent children, women, and older adults.” Hassan Nasrallah, the Hezbollah leader, vowed Israel would “pay the price of spilling their blood.”